IT leaders may be in the best position to help prevent a “fire, ready, aim” approach to using social media. This may sound counter-intuitive at first. After all, IT blocks social media, right? Not so. I’d suggest that any organization that’s getting serious about using social media has a lot to gain by leveraging IT people’s natural strengths of connecting technology’s value to the business as a whole.

Here are 5 ways IT can be a force for social media good, while protecting the needs (and IP) of the business. A slideshare eBook version of the content is embedded at the bottom of this post that you can download too. [Read more…]

Embarrassing, #FAIL-worthy tweets from corporate accounts is nothing new. When it does happen, media coverage and case studies ensue. Smart brands respond appropriately. Others make the situation worse. The municipality I live in has become the latest victim of the tweet-gone-bad phenomenon. In this case, an offensive, obscene message was tweeted from the corporate account. It’s possible the account was hacked. It’s more likely this was accidental, and the person responsible thought they were updating their personal account. What made this message so offensive is that the tweet criticized city residents and their inability to handle snow – during the biggest snowstorm we’ve seen in years.

This situation gives those of us who aren’t suffering through a real-time PR nightmare a chance to reflect on four basic ways to protect our own organizations from being tomorrow’s social media case-study. [Read more…]

In May 2012, I was invited to present at Social Media Camp 2012, the largest social media conference in Western Canada. There’s a growing number of people (like me) who regularly try and balance “doing social” with other full-time responsibilities.

As a result, every social advocate, in any sized organization, faces the danger of diminishing returns without coordinated and sustained help. My session provided a 5-stage framework for business leaders to get find and train the help required – and then keep it going.

My thanks to the many people who attended my session, and then shared what they learned socially.

What separates great sellers from the pack is their deep knowledge of a customer’s business. The trick for any salesperson – regardless of tenure & industry – is finding the time necessary to learn about a customer, and using those insights to create impactful appointments.

Here are three easy ways to use social media to learn about customers while saving time – by bringing timely information right to you, so you don’t need to hunt for it. [Read more…]